Lede

The hustle sermon says anyone can ascend. The numbers ask: how, and at whose cost.

How To Get Rich | Garys Economics

What does not make sense

• Selling freedom as a product while hiding the risk curve.
• Pretending employees are not value creators but founders are.
• Calling every freelancer an entrepreneur while cutting safety nets.
• Pitching a nation of bosses. Who cleans, cares, repairs, and lifts.
• Promising robot utopia without showing who captures the gains.

Sense check / The numbers

1. Self-employment is big and skewed older. Around 4.3 million in the UK, with a record 991,000 aged 60+, and state pension age rising to 67 noted in context. Older workers are pushed or pulled into it. [The Guardian based on Rest Less and ONS]
2. Startup failure is common. Around 70 percent fail within five years. Two thirds do not last ten years. These are not vibes. They are survival rates. [DemandSage; The Guardian]
3. The tax tilt is real. Median self-employed pay an effective rate near 17 percent vs 27 percent for employees in 2025 to 2026. Treasury loss projected over 10 billion pounds a year by decade end. [Financial Times summarising Resolution Foundation]
4. Risk of automation is wide. OECD puts about 28 percent of jobs at high risk across members. UK estimates often cluster near 30 percent over the next 20 years. [OECD; PwC]
5. Robots and wages are mixed. Meta analysis and EU studies find small average gains or inequality effects, not a blanket pay rise. Some see mean wages up a little. Others find higher wage gaps. Nuance beats slogans. [ScienceDirect meta analysis; Bruegel; LSE CEP]
6. The self-made label is messy. Share of rich who started firms has risen, yet the line between networks, capital, and inheritance is blurry, and methods are contested. Treat the badge with caution. [Chicago Booth; Forbes; Sociology 2025 note]

The sketch

Scene 1: A stage. Spotlight. Guru booms, Start your empire today. A cleaner in the aisle whispers, Who closes tonight.
Scene 2: Office kitchen. A freelancer stirs instant noodles at 11 pm. A glitter mug reads, Be your own boss. The invoice reads, Net 60.
Scene 3: Factory floor. A shiny robot stacks boxes. A sign says, Productivity up 18 percent. A smaller sign says, Pay review pending. Worker whispers, Who gets the rise?

What to watch, not the show

• Who bears risk: sick pay, holidays, insurance, late invoices, and downtime.
• Survival math: margins, customer acquisition cost, and time to breakeven.
• The tax wedge that nudges work from payroll to self-employment.
• Bargaining power where robots land first and where they do not.
• Ownership of the machines and the data that trains them.
• Policy moves on NICs, benefits portability, and training.

The Hermit take

Work is not a sermon. It is a ledger.
Robots will not save fairness. Rules and ownership might.

Keep or toss

Verdict: Toss.
Keep real choices and portable benefits.
Toss the miracle pitch with no numbers.

Sources

Rest Less analysis via The Guardian report on older self-employment rise, UK: https://www.theguardian.com/money/article/2024/aug/26/uk-has-record-991000-self-employed-workers-aged-60-or-over
DemandSage startup failure rates 2025 summary: https://www.demandsage.com/startup-failure-rate/
The Guardian business column on 10 year startup survival: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/dec/08/startup-businesses-failing
Resolution Foundation tax gap via FT report, 2025: https://www.ft.com/content/00703334-b00e-4ce9-b9b9-36dad40b8c6b
OECD future of work automation risk page: https://www.oecd.org/en/topics/policy-issues/future-of-work.html
PwC long run UK automation risk note: https://www.pwc.co.uk/economic-services/ukeo/ukeo-july18-net-impact-ai-uk-jobs.pdf
Robots and wages meta analysis 2025, ScienceDirect abstract: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0954349X2500150X
Bruegel working paper on EU robots, employment, and wages: https://www.bruegel.org/sites/default/files/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Working-Paper-AB_25042018.pdf
LSE CEP DP1902 on robot adoption and wage inequality: https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp1902.pdf
Chicago Booth Review on self-made billionaires trend: https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/billionaires-self-made
Forbes 400 self-made score explainer: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2020/09/08/self-made-score/
Sociology research note 2025 on self-made wealth methods: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00380385251380755